Body Snatchers
by Vanessa S. Quest
Summary: ConYuu MuRam. Strange flowers are cropping up in deserted villages, what could all of this mean? A suspended hiatus from me, that's what. Please R & R gently. Light ConYuu.


Body Snatchers

As Yuri looked around at the crowding hallway he felt a sense of forlorn. After his latest endeavor to Shin Makoku he had gone straight to school only to recall today's biology quiz on botany. Unfortunately that was all he recalled on the subject-matter.

The devastating effects of the quiz behind him, Yuri moved to the alternate classroom to eat his lunch and wait for the next class to start.

Instead of being put in a sour mood as Yuri fell through a portal of run-off water, Yuri decided to look at it more positively. Namely, he decided to stop and smell the- uh- well whatever those tri-petal yellow and neon-green flowers were. Leaning closer to it, he smelt the faint scent of orange, taking in the smell more deeply he saw the petals fold outward revealing their stamen and tip of the pistol. The scent became stronger then, and as it did, the petals began to fall off, changing color to blue-violet before hitting ground. The pistol plumped and burst with seeds, all right before Yuri's eyes.

Standing up, he realized he was in a field of these flowers, the village roves were covered in the seeds of the flowers themselves. To Yuri, it was breathtaking.

If he had known how much trouble this would be, he probably wouldn't have found it _that_ pretty.

Collecting his bag Yuri began walking toward the village, finding it starkly empty and otherwise uninhabited. Besides the flowers and their remnant molted petals and seeds, there was no other vegetation really, no dogs, no cats, no bad-omen birds, but most of all no people. He didn't even see any flies buzzing around. It made him nervous, the only sounds beside his own footfalls was a gentle rasping of wind as it brushed blue-purple streams past him.

He wandered through the village a bit longer, truly baffled that such a place could really be so empty, until he came to the village well. It suddenly became crowded with flies and rats as they broke ranks to cover sacks of meat left for them.

Yuri found all of this very confusing and decided to investigate. Upon closer look he realized it wasn't meat they were ransacking, but juicy large pieces of fruit, the same neon-green as the tri-petal flowers made a jelly that oozed from the exposed sacks, the outside a deep indigo and the innermost layer a mix of shades of burgundy, blood-red, yellow, and blue-green.

"Is this some harvest ritual or something?" Yuri asked himself, suddenly uncomfortable around so many vermin and the thoughts of diseases this might bring him. "That's probably it! They're probably tending the fields now… I really should get back now."

Narrating his actions, Yuri left to go back to the castle, utterly unaware of the changing eye-color of the vermin.

*

Once back at the castle Yuri was greeted by the usual entourage and typical barrage of accusations and sexual-harassment. Between Gunter's pleas for love-children, Wolfram's claims of infidelity, and Greta's complaints of him being away for months, Yuri decided it would be best to simply appease them with his audience. Deciding upon this, Yuri placed a natural order of operations: Greta's first, as she is the cutest of the three, then Wolfram, because he is the most violent of the three but would be okay if he was second-placed by _his_ daughter, and lastly Gunter… who would drag Yuri off for who-knows-how-long to do mountains of paperwork.

Yuri was left with a thought that made him question if his maohship had led to the deforestation of any one particular area, with the amount of paper-work they did and all, or did they recycle? He probably should bring it up. He did want to help the environment out, after all.

Meeting the obligations, Yuri's stomach growled after three hours of anticipated paperwork.

The day ended otherwise uneventfully before Yuri retired to his chambers. That night Yuri had a strange recurring dream of Cheri's garden sprawling more and more of the strange flowers he had seen, the fruits piling up in Shinou's shrine by the fountain as the area grew more and more empty. Investigating it, he saw the walls protrude veins of blue-green that pulsed as he walked past.

Finally unnerved about it, he began banging on doors trying to find _someone_ when he spotted one of the maids- thinking to himself he confirmed Sangria was the red-head. Calling out to her, she stopped but didn't turn to face him. Wondering if he had made a mistake he called out 'Effie' instead, with no reaction, approaching her he put a hand on her shoulder, turning her around. He spotted her chewing on the same strange fruit from before, her eyes seeming a much more vivid blue-green then he originally thought they were.

At the sound of soft footsteps behind him, he spun around to spot Julia. Inaudibly she lipped, 'Get out now.' Yuri swallowed heavily, turning around to see Sangria's look grow crazed as she continued to devour the fruit, spotting the veins in her neck he saw how they too were turning blue-green, just as the walls had. 'Don't go into the cellar.'

Yuri, as if following the credo of every horror movie ever made thus made the executive decision that exploring the basement, in this dream, was a great idea. Immediately upon deciding this, he went down the steps of the West Tower into one of the many stock-piles for foods and coincidentally a cellar.

As he walked through he spotted what must have been spider cocoons, no, maybe bear-bees because their webbing looked similar to giant spiders, he soon heard the sound of groans before deciding it probably wasn't bear-bees after all. Swallowing hard he took Morgif from his hilt, that 'til now he didn't realize was with him, using the dull sword he chopped out a patch of web exposing the living-remains of Sangria- Effie- whatever that maid's name was. Upon the sight of it, he heard the tell-tale sounds of the bad-guy behind him getting ready to have his revenge and slice him wide open, or at least that was the logical assumption Yuri made as his eyes shot open wide with terror.

Sitting up in bed he screamed, "SANGRIA! EFFIE!" Immediately following the outbreak was a loud cracking sound followed by a throbbing pain in Yuri's jaw as Wolfram sat up, fuming.

"_WHAT THE HELL?!_ With the _hired help_ now?! You cheating no good… I'm sleeping in my room tonight." Wolfram took his pillow with a harrumph before storming out, leaving Yuri further bewildered.

He was unsure of when Wolfram had snuck in.

When morning came, Yuri felt a throb in his jaw and a crick in his neck, along with a shrill in his ear as Gunter lectured Wolfram staunchly.

"Oh how _could_ you? And to heika's face no less!"

"You should have heard the horrible things he was saying last night in my ear! He's lucky I didn't hit him harder. Let's see you chat up the girls with _that_ bruise!"

Yuri, having had his fill of it decided to snip, "Is that an open invitation?"

Snapping his finger, Wolfram would have channeled an elemental fire-lion had Gunter not tackled the blond and drag him off to the art wing.

Catching the tail-end of the encounter, Conrad stifled his chuckle by masking it as a cough.

Rubbing his sore neck, Yuri turned to smile at Conrad, "Well _I_ thought it was funny at least."

"It serves him right, but my, Yuri-heika, dreaming about maids? What do you think they would say if they heard about such a thing?"

Pausing, Yuri contemplated before commenting, "They'd probably cry and say I ruined their yaoi poll." He hung his head in defeat, he really doubted they'd swoon and be overflowing with joy.

"…" Conrad smiled softly at Yuri, melting away that unease he felt at being rejected even in his imagination.

"Conrad, have you ever seen a flower that changes colors? When I came back yesterday I landed in a whole field of a flower I've never seen before."

"I can't say that I have, but mother would be more of an authority on the matter."

"It doesn't really matter that much." Yuri shrugged. Down the hallway he and Conrad heard the distinct tirade of Wolfram venting on any and every 'understanding' ear he could find. "Then again, it wouldn't hurt."

Conrad quickly and safely led Yuri away from the war-path toward Cheri's private chambers just as Wolfram spotted Murata and began to bellow on about the cheating wimp being such a… a… cheater!

*

Fixing his glasses, Murata made the same suggestion he recommended to Wolfram every time the blond came to him with this sort of issue. "Well, you should just cheat back, I, as your friend, volunteer my services and body to your just cause."

9 out of 10 times this would result in being stomped on the foot, but every 1 out of 10 Wolfram would give him a quick pinch to the ass and an, "I'll think about it." Murata happily thought to himself that his foot wasn't sore.

*

Yuri found that Cheri's room in Covenant Castle wasn't what he exactly expected given her décor at sea. Instead of a sultry red-light-district setup, there was an elegant air to the place. The earthy tones and collection of two or three bookshelves and pictures made the room look, well, classy really. He realized he really should give up guessing what people's rooms would look like to suit their personalities, short of Yozak's room being full of frilly dresses and Conrad's room being a soldier's barrack, Yuri was certain he'd never have placed Gwendel as the type to have purple sheets, or Gisela the type to collect taxidermy and fine-dolls. Next to each other. It made him wonder if Wolfram's room would be full of lesbian porn or a shrine to T-Zou or something equally outlandish.

"I've heard of it, I might have a book on some plants like that in my botanical library."

Yuri kicked himself, hard, mentally. He probably could have aced that test if he had just asked Cheri to tell him how to identify a plant by leaf or petal. He was sure Shori would maim him for going down in class rank because he went to Shin Makoku instead of study.

"May I see it then?" Yuri asked, well they had already come that far.

"Of course, Conrad can you take him there? It should be kept with the 'unusual and exotic' section. I'm afraid other than that I don't know which book it will be in."

"It would be my pleasure. Yuri?"

Yuri nodded, "Sure, thank you Cheri-sama." Conrad led Yuri to a corridor he had walked past several times, and gone down three or four times at most. This was the hall that led to the storage rooms with all those weird heirlooms and magical charms.

*

Rubbing his stiffening neck, Yuri walked down the tight spiral staircase as less and less natural lighting poured through the windows and more and more lanterns lit up the walls to guide them. Upon reaching the bottom of the staircase Yuri was struck with a sense of déjà vu, this looked like it was right out of a horror movie, it hardly seemed used, so much that even the maids gave up on cleaning out the cob-webs.

A resound, 'No,' struck him as if his senses were yelling at him to go upstairs. Writing it off as jitters from the spooky atmosphere, he brushed it off and looked at Conrad, "This looks pretty creepy down here. The cob-webs really add a …hardly… lived-in feel." Yuri muttered.

"Mother always said it was more fitting for the place."

"Oh, right, because it's a demon's palace… creepy is better, gotcha."

"…Actually, it was because she thought it looked more natural. This _is_ the botanical library after all."

"…Heh, yeah, that too. Natural." Yuri laughed nervously.

Conrad smiled, "It's right this way." Bowing he used his arms to point Yuri in the correct direction, following after him.

Taking the lead, Yuri approached an oak door in time to feel something crawl beneath his skin across his neck, shivering. He shot up bolt-straight when it moved down his spine before turning around to spot Conrad smirking a bit deviously with his index finger sticking out.

"You scared me half-to-death!" Yuri breathed out, holding his chest. "Ugh, I thought it was a spider or something… uh, not like spiders _scare_ me or anything. I mean, I am the _Maoh_."

"Of course not, I apologize. I couldn't help myself though."

As Conrad spoke to Yuri, Yuri felt his neck throb again, this time so severely it was as if he were being struck in the back of the neck with a two-by-four. Falling forward, Yuri fainted.

"Yuri… YURI?" Conrad pulled a torch from the wall to investigate Yuri's down form when he spotted a suspicious lump on the back of Yuri's neck, a blue-green thrombus, hair-like spindles threaded just below the skin moving up and down and radiating from the center as if mapping his blood-vessels. In the center of the thrombus was the shed remains of a seed-pod.

Lifting the teenaged double-black, Conrad carried Yuri back up the stairs where he began to open his eyes as the sunlight shone over his face.

"Yuri-heika, you should rest."

"What… when did it get so light down here…?"

"You passed out, heika."

"It's Yuri, you know for the person who named me, you forget my name a lot."

"I apologize, heika."

Yuri growled at Conrad.

"I apologize, _Yuri_."

"That's better." Yuri smiled, "That's weird, it felt like someone clocked me in the neck." Yuri rubbed the back of his neck, then down to his shoulder, surprised that it too had become so stiff.

*

Yuri was surprised with how little he was being bombarded by Gunter and Gwendel. Conrad had told him they were in meetings with some of the different villages and Yozak for the most of the day. However, when Yozak had finally gotten out of his briefing with Gwendel he found Yuri and Conrad walking by.

"Oh, boyo! There you are. I heard you weren't feeling well today. Is the captain taking care of you?"

"Ah, yeah. Thanks for your concern." Yuri smiled, then looked dismayed, "…Who told you I wasn't feeling well?"

Conrad looked at Yozak with a warning, Yozak smiled playfully, "Oh you know, the wind. So have you heard about any of the strange rumors about the villages just drying up?"

"You mean like a drought?" Yuri turned his head to the side, "No one mentioned one to me."

"Not like a drought, heika. I mean like everyone there just disappeared, people used to dealing with other villages find out that no one has been around from their neighboring villages, go back and find them emptied."

"Really? That was just like the village I came through."

"What?!" Yozak and Conrad both gave each other a strong glare, Conrad immediately turned his attentions to Yuri's neck, the blue-green thrombus had disappeared in daylight, but if he squinted he could still make out a soft tint of cool turquoise running just under the surface.

"You didn't pick anything up while you were there, did you? You didn't eat anything… or drink anything, right?" Yozak took hold of Yuri's shoulders, shaking him slightly.

"No! Of course not, I mean, I smelled a flower in the meadow, but I didn't do anything else."

"Heika, can you remember which village it was? I need to inform the others about it if it's another one."

"Oh, sure, it was about five miles to the east."

"Thanks." Yozak gave Conrad a knowing look as Conrad grabbed his sleeve.

"You don't think this is an invasion or something, do you?"

Yozak looked darkly as he met Yuri's eyes, "No. I don't think it's an _invasion_." What he didn't say spoke volumes unto itself.

Conrad knew Yozak would go investigate it, he was certain of that much. "Yozak, why don't you take Gisela with you, I'm sure she could use the time to gather some medicinal herbs, don't you agree?"

"Of course, Captain." Yozak mentioned before walking past them.

*

By that evening, neither Yozak nor Gisela returned. Yuri had gone to the courtyard to find Murata chatting up Wolfram. "Murata, what are you doing here? You usually don't spend the night in the castle." Yuri asked.

By Wolfram's reddening blush he figured out exactly what he was planning to do, well, at least who.

"Ah, yes, but I got the feeling you needed me here, that and the shrine maidens are busy cleaning out the temple for one of Shinou's favorite rituals. You'd be surprised how much he becomes like a little kid counting down for it." Murata's eyebrow twitched as he thought about it.

"A ritual? But there isn't a holiday coming up." Wolfram mentioned.

"Oh, no, it wouldn't be one." Throughout Murata's mind's eye he saw shrine maidens waltzing around in fine black wigs and contact lenses, parading around in Shinou's harem of untouched maidens like some giddy old pervert chasing the skirts about.

"Murata, your eyebrow's really twitching."

"Ah, yes, that's my Shibuya-needs-me-sense you see there." Murata smiled, fixing his glasses. "But as you don't seem to need me it must be on the fritz, hey Wolfram, come and help me fix it, will you?"

Yuri gave Murata a strange look before the two scampered off. "Realllll subtle." He laughed slightly before sitting at the garden, looking over the flowers, he touched some of the more reachable, beautiful blooms. As he did so, several small speckles fell from his cuff into the mass of green flora. Looking through the garden itself he spotted one of the color-changing flowers near where he was reaching.

This one seemed different, though, instead of yellow-and-green, the flower was changing from yellow to blue and still a bud.

"Oh, so that's what you look like before maturing." He touched the flower itself in time to see the bud unwrap, the petals changing from yellow-to-blue to yellow-to-neon-green. With the color change, Yuri felt a wave of weakness before slumping into the garden, unconscious.

It felt like it must have been hours later, the way the sky had progressed, because when Yuri felt the waxing gibbon moon's light fall on him, he awoke. It seemed surreal, but the entire garden was now covered with the yellow-to-neon-green tri-petal flower. In the moonlight, his blue pendant shone brightly, the gentle wind kissing his skin and practically whispered into his ear.

'Get away from these.'

Yuri's eyes went wide, he didn't know that when the wind whispered it was actually intelligible. Yuri quickly got out of the garden and back inside the castle, as the same soft wind continued to sway the flowers and the clouds the moon's light was gradually blocked. The flowers volume seemed to increase, overtaking the other flowers within the garden as the moon's rays were absent.

*

Murata looked on from the window within Wolfram's private chamber, his glasses gleaming, "Interesting…"

Wolfram approached Murata causing the double-black to turn around. "And what's that?"

"…You don't normally accept my advances, so it's interesting that you would." Murata would have asked if Shinou was possessing him, that is, if he didn't know the god was otherwise indisposed with hundreds of beautiful women parading around to his fetish.

"And you normally don't mean them."

"Is this where I say something dashing to woo you?"

"If you do that, I'll kill you. Don't make this embarrassing." Wolfram covered his hand over his face, peeking his green eyes through the slender fingers, practically posing in his pink negligee for Murata.

"Right, so don't say anything to embarrass you… such as 'I am going to ravish you until you can't stand' or should I just limit it to all night?"

Wolfram snapped his finger only to be pulled to the bed, Murata landing on top of him and thus, via distraction, dowsing the fire-elemental before he could let the fire-cat out of the bag.

*

Lying awake in bed, Yuri continued to listen to the sounds flooding his room, namely the sound of heavy breathing outside his door. Somehow Conrad had convinced Yuri to let him place a guard by his door in case he fell ill again. Conrad had also stated his own willingness to keep a bedpost vigil, to which Yuri happily agreed. However; now, with Gunter outside breathing heavily at being so close to Yuri's prone sleeping form, and Conrad's sultry bedroom-eyes looking at him… well, okay maybe they weren't lidded with the deep passions burning in the pit of a romance novel, but he was still sexier than the teen was used to sleeping next to sans a handful of awkward camp-outs where exhaustion dictated sleep. No, now he was stuck in a comfortable bed with healthy thoughts of a teenaged boy beside someone deemed sexy and in close proximity, with a heavy breather right outside. It felt dirty how voyeur that breath sounded. He could feel Gunter rape his own purity within that imagination of his.

Eventually that awkward thought was enough of a distraction to allow for Yuri to fall asleep next to Conrad in bed.

Half-way through the night, Yuri fell into a vivid dream, or at least he thought it was a dream. In his dream he was walking down, down, and further down a perpetual spiral, as he did, he spotted web-cocoons the size of bodies, green-blue veins pulsing up and down the walls in which the cocoons were attached, and the smell of citrus wafting from all around. He wondered if those weird fruits were around, as if to answer him, he saw Lasagna and Doria carrying a large fruit the size of a body up to the window before dumping it into water.

"Yuri-heika, Yuri please wake up."

Yuri blinked his eyes open to see Conrad smiling at him, "Oh, is something wrong, Conrad?"

Conrad looked at the bleary-eyed teen, the same teenager who had just been screaming in his sleep until just moments ago.

"…No, nothing, please get some rest."

"Oh… uh… sure, Conrad."

Just as Yuri's eyes closed a shrill scream filled the corridor, as did the rustling of Gunter's cape as he stood, sword drawn. Yuri flew up out of bed, Conrad putting an arm ahead of him as he too drew his sword.

"What's going on out there?!" Yuri asked, shocked. Conrad approached the window to check outside, the entire courtyard was filled to the brim with glowing flowers yellow-to-green, several patches of a royal blue seemed to be the only exception, that and several obscenely large fruits by the fountain.

Gunter's voice broke Conrad's concentration over the yard, "What is the meaning of this?"

"She's gone… she was right there but now she's gone!"

Yuri opened the door to find Effie sobbing, "Lasagna is gone… Doria went looking for her."

"What about Sangria?" Gunter asked the distraught woman.

"She isn't like herself at all, when we woke her up and told her Lasagna was gone she just started laughing… it was very creepy laughter, like this… _heheheheh ehehehehe_." Effie cleared her throat. "It was much eerier in person."

"…" Gunter wanted to implant his hand through his forehead for that, but instead opted to give a sympathetic, "…I'm sure it was. "

"She isn't the only person who's gone, either! Raoul is gone too, the guard who normally patrols the servant quarters…"

Gunter looked to the side, not really wanting to inform Effie that this is weakening her case as far as cause for alarm… well, over Lasagna's safety at least. The state of affairs for the _rest_ of the serving staff might be a little less, however.

"So were the other four guards for our section."

"5 on 1 what kind of girl _IS_ she…!" Gunter lashed out before coughing into his fist, "Hem, I mean, please, do go on."

"I went searching for Dorcas to help us look but he was gone too."

"…Dorcas?" This made Gunter pause, during the pause Wolfram sauntered over with an obvious bow-legged sway.

"_What_ is_ with_ all this racket? I'm trying to sleep and each time I'm about to drift off there's some girl's shrill scream or creepy laughter. Are you having a slumber party or something? Seriously, some of us have the natural-resources to use beauty sleep."

"Wait, did the laugh sound like_ heheheheh ehehehehe_? My, it traveled all the way to you and geika? I'm sorry if anyone interrupted …hem… _that_. Didn't you two finish up hours ago, though?"

Wolfram turned shades of livid. "I was asleep in my room when I heard that creepy laugh! And it sounded more timbre, you know, you have to project more, it was like _this _heheheheh hee-eh-heheheh ehehehehe."

"You're right, that is creepy." Gunter nodded.

"This is turning out just like my dream!" Yuri said, in great upset, "I know what I have to do. To the basement!"

"…Yuri, you woke up screaming in your dream…" Conrad whispered into his ear.

"True, but the best way to face a problem is head-on." Yuri said, resolutely.

"I thought it was with planning…?" Effie asked no-one, several handsome men glaring at her told her elsewise though.

"Wait a second, when I came here… you were coming out of the room with Conrad…" Wolfram put together. "You cheating louse! First the help, now my brother?!"

Yuri covered his face, "Can we deal with this later? Wolfram, help them look for the missing people, Conrad, Gunter you two come with me. Let's get to the bottom of this."

Conrad just raised his scarred eyebrow in concern.

Approaching the botany library, Yuri was surprised to find the strange blue-green veins from his dreams actually running along the walls. Likewise to his dream were the cocoons of webbing.

"In my dream, there were people in these… we should cut it down and see what's inside." Yuri mentioned to Gunter and Conrad.

Holding a torch, Conrad guided where Gunter should cut as the silky-haired man made the incision to reveal Sangria, her neck and arms covered in blue-green strings in the shape of veins.

Yuri's eyes went wide as she blinked her eyes open to look at him. Her cool green eyes seemed darker than they had in his dream. "Gunter, Conrad, we have to keep cutting those things down."

Grabbing his head, Yuri leaned into the wall.

"Yuri-heika? Are you alright?" Conrad asked, measuring him.

"My head… everything is spinning…"

Conrad and Gunter went silent as they saw the green-blue lines across Yuri's face just as the ones had around Sangria. As Sangria was coming more out of her haze she began to screech and wipe the excess off of her, the forming pile shrinking as it lost its host.

After almost toppling down the remaining stairs, Conrad decided it safest to bring Yuri to ground-level.

Closing his eyes, Yuri's body began to glow an incandescent violet that clashed greatly against the blue-green hue running below the surface of his skin. His obsidian shaded eyes opened in time to spot his creeping shadow as it branched out, moving to form a lattice-work as intricate as a spider's web or root-network.

"What in the… it looks just like roots. This is because of those flowers isn't it?" Yuri said, eyes locked onto the shadow itself.

Yuri almost fell over when his shadow answered him. "Aren't my flowers beautiful?"

Shooting a look at Conrad then back to his talking shadow Yuri hoped he wasn't losing his mind.

"…You're doing this, aren't you? You're putting people into these husks and replacing them aren't you?" Gunter asked, "What did you do with all of the villagers you did this to?"

Conrad looked at Yuri knowing full well that the teen would not like the answer.

"Why, I let them join me, I can have everyone join into one community, Maoh-heika. I just need someone with enough power to set the roots. If I absorb you I can make everyone live in harmony without war or famine, just at peace with each other and surrounded by beautiful flowers."

Conrad glared, "Let them join you? More like you eat them then replace them with lures full of seeds for your flowers!"

"Those so-called lures are the physical duplicates of those that I absorb. Come now, Maoh-heika, the others happily become one with my flowers, but not everyone can become part of the root-network. With so many new additions, I need you to join with me. Think of it, a world where Mazoku and human kind can mingle freely… everyone retaining their youthful self and you can be responsible for all of that."

*

Murata looked at the pigeon with the heart-marked message questioning cynically just how Yozak knew to send it to _Wolfram's_ room. Apparently when Yozak left this afternoon he stopped off at the temple to collect information. Also apparent was the dripping irony of what would have to be done to make Murata's karma balance out for the fun time he just had courtesy of Shinou.

"You really are a mean-spirited little kid. And a pervert, Shinou." He sighed, taking the letter he looked out into the horizon and groaned, somehow he knew, deep down, that tapping it with Wolfram would cost him direly. A cosmic check for his ass to cash, as it were.

Leaning back into the fluffy canopy bed, Murata sighed, "I better go find Shibuya then."

*

Yuri watched in horrified fascination as his legs became heavier in feeling. He collapsed to his knees as flowers sprouted around him. He felt like asking why him, but the answer was pretty obvious as far as powers go.

"All you have to do is sacrifice yourself for everyone else's happiness and prosperity. Doesn't that sound wonderful? You can have your own peaceful oblivion and the rest of your world will become a collective conscious thanks to your fuel."

"Oblivion?!" Conrad and Yuri said in simultaneous distress.

"You might as well give it up now, you know you're already infected. This is just a courtesy." The shadow itself crept up Yuri's legs.

"No, I don't want that! I want everyone to be at peace because they choose to, not because they're forced to! Doing that takes away their free will!"

"It doesn't, it just gives them a collective will."

"That's the same thing as taking it away! You're just trying to talk circles, which means this isn't a courtesy. You might be able to get others to fold but if you could have done that to me, you would have without saying a word."

"Tch. Think of it like this then, I could simply absorb them and not integrate them, should I do that instead?"

Seeing the green-blue pulsing up and down his arms, Yuri tried to claw them off, without effect. Looking up, Yuri realized those same blue-green veins were now showing through beneath Conrad and Gunter's clothes just above their skin.

"Yuri I would choose to fall into oblivion with you then to have you go there alone." Conrad said resolutely, "But I'm not going to just let that happen, either."

The shadow began to take the form of webbing surrounding Yuri's legs, squeezing them tightly earning a small yelp from Yuri.

Forcing himself to move forward through the tangle of green-blue strings of veins, Conrad approached Yuri, putting his hands on the webbing he pulled at it, tearing parts off only to be replaced twice as fast as he could remove.

"Shibuya, I'm here to save you." Murata said, eyebrow twitching as T-Zou chomped on my ass. "See, the twitching brow never lies." He glared upward as he silently cursed Shinou for being mean-spirited and knowing this would happen.

T-Zou, upon spotting the webs pounced it.

"Botany really isn't your strong-point is it, Shibuya? You've been calling these things plants from the beginning, weren't you? Didn't you realize fungus can grow at night, or share the same root-system?"

"Geh… I give up, now just help me, Murata. I'll pretend you and Wolfram didn't go off for wild sex, or I'll be adamantly clear that you two did that… whichever one works to your advantage better, but hurry."

Murata smirked as he fixed his glasses, "T-Zou and friends GO!" He announced, launching his hand forward as if flinging a poké-ball. As several sheep stampeded toward them, the sheep began to decimate the fungus until the root system was completely severed. Just as the roots were destroyed several of the sacks of webs collapsed to the floor on their own.

Conrad helped Yuri stand, brushing him off to rid him of debris. "Alright, so I get that they were mushroom-flowers… and the roots were mold hyphae well, whatever, but what the heck were those fruits?"

Murata stretched, "Do you really want the answer to that?"

"…Yes. I think fungus is the next chapter we're covering in biology. They all have the same cell-type but they can take different shapes and reproduce asexually and sexually through… I dunno, let's say magic."

"Try through crossed hyphae, those fruits were where they were sexually reproducing."

Yuri suppressed his urge to vomit, gagging just the same. "_That_ was sex? The rats were eating those, what the hell…"

"…That just means it didn't want to change, it thought it was perfect so it didn't want to alter itself. That or it might have thought it would be unable to keep control if there was variation." Murata hypothesized.

"Okay, all in favor of naming that 'Really gross fungus-thing' say ai." Yuri looked around, "Ugh, no takers huh?"

"It already has a name, Shibuya. It's called the _Trikaleido homunculi_ mushroom."

"You could just make that it's common name, Yuri." Conrad smiled, "Or you could call it 'Not a fungi' if you prefer."

Yuri managed to suppress a groan, "Heh, yeah… that's a …you know, I think I like trikaleido… what was it called again Murata?"

"Trikaleido homunculi."

"Yeah, that, better. You know, so there's no confusion or anything between the common name and real name if we just call it the same thing. I'm good with that. But thanks for the suggestion." Yuri patted Conrad's shoulder in consolation.

Leaning in to whisper to Yuri, Conrad kissed his ear, "That's fine, I'm just glad you're alright."

"I don't know what part of this is alright, but eh, it's close enough." Yuri slung his arm over Conrad's shoulder. "Murata, I'm supposed to call it off with Wolfram, right? In a stern unwavering voice so he'll take me seriously this time."

"Pretty much." Murata answered.

"Alright, Conrad, would you help me out with this, and give him something to really walk in on?"

"I'd be honored."

The End.


End file.
